bug#11187: fmt: doesn't understand multibyte characters (UTF-8)

"Dmitry E. Oboukhov" <[email protected]> Tue, 3 Mar 2026 15:30:40 +0300

Newsgroups	gmane.comp.gnu.core-utils.bugs
Message-ID	<aabUcP3reae77NB9@nbw>

Greetings from the year 2026!

I am writing to celebrate a truly historic milestone. I just checked
the 'fmt' utility in my fresh Debian system (version 9.7, copyright
2025), and I am thrilled to see that this bug is still alive and well
after fourteen years of dedicated neglect.

It is a rare feat in the software industry to maintain such consistent
incompetence. Your man page proudly displays "2025," yet the code
remains a pristine monument to the 1970s, incapable of understanding
that a single character might occupy more than one byte.

Even an AI (which, by the way, is how many people discover your
"future-dated" tools now) can count characters better than 'fmt'. Is
the plan to wait until the 20th anniversary of this bug before you
consider using mbrtowc()? Or is the "GNU way" simply to ignore every
language on Earth that isn't English until the heat death of the
universe?

I tried formatting Greek text (2 bytes per char), and 'fmt' broke the
lines exactly twice as often as it should. It's almost poetic: a tool
from the birthplace of modern logic being mangled by a tool that
refuses to use any.

Please, don't fix it now. At this point, it’s not a bug—it’s a
heritage site. I look forward to checking in again in 2030 to see if
you've managed to reach the 8-bit era.

Keep up the "stunning" progress.
Best regards,

A user with a calendar and a multibyte keyboard.

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